


Bottle of Sunshine

by Lolibat



Category: Bleach
Genre: Cuddles, Hibernation fluff, Hollow Ichigo best Ichigo, M/M, Prompt: cuddling for warmth, Urahara pc 5 event, Uraichi - Freeform, blanket fluff, winter fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:55:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28009575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lolibat/pseuds/Lolibat
Summary: “Ichigo-kun,” Kisuke pokes the boy with Benihime. He feels her laughter, in the back of his mind. “Good morning, Ichigo-kun,” he tries again.There is no response; the God-slaying teenager curls into a tighter ball, and it would be cute if it wasn’t his electric bill going through the roof.In which winter is coming, and Ichigo's hollow side decide to show through in less violent ways. How curious, Kisuke thinks.
Relationships: Kurosaki Ichigo/Urahara Kisuke
Comments: 7
Kudos: 200
Collections: UraIchi Prompt Challenge #5





	Bottle of Sunshine

Kisuke doesn’t notice anything odd at first. The war is over, the dust has settled over Karakura; life finds a way to carry on. The Shinigami patrol is once again a joke, and the kids are back to school. Status quo as always.

He’s left alone in his labs, working on bits and pieces of Quincy technology replicas and memorabilia from the war. He hears from the grapevine that Mayuri is trying to resurrect Quincy corpses for his uses, but he knows better than to try any of that; Ishida’s got an entire quiver of arrows with Mayuri’s name on it (if Ryuken doesn’t reach him first). He has no wish to reserve a second quiver for himself. 

He absently brushes his hair out of his eyes and rubs the bridge of his nose. The scars he has from Benihime give him ridges all over his face. Aside from a mild shaving inconvenience, he doesn’t really mind. He thinks it looks rather fetching, though Yoruichi snorts in his face the first time he says that. She still hasn’t forgiven him for forcing her into Shushin Chohengen form, but he has confidence she’ll come around sooner or later. And even if she never forgives him for it, well Kisuke has no regrets. He didn’t have to take Yoruichi home in a body bag, and that’s all that matters at the end of the day. 

The kids grow far too quickly, leaving for Todai one by one. Isshin sobs dramatically the day Ichigo leaves and drinks three bottles of sake by himself; Shinji knocks him out with the blunt end of Sakanade before the sun even sets.

“Be glad it ain’t tha sharp end, ya big lout.” He retorts. Kisuke snorts and pours him another drink. 

What Isshin _doesn’t_ know is that Ichigo leaves, but he always returns. He opens Gargantas wherever he goes (“God, do you know how annoying it is to have to deal with the JR in the mornings?”). Kisuke’s humble little candy shop is no exception. 

He drops in sometimes with questions. “Kisuke! Quick, who’s the one who wrote Tosa Niki in the Heian period?” 

“Ichigo-kun, I’m not doing your online quiz for you.” He pretends to look disappointed from behind his fan. Ichigo flips him off and disappears in a blink. The Garganta closes behind him with what appears to be a dainty little burp.

Sometimes he visits just to see his sisters, other times he visits to catch up… or to just rant. (“Oh god, Kisuke, there’s a freaking _pandemic_ , and this asshole wants us to write a 5k essay on Paradise Lost.”)

On this occasion, he walks into the shoten with a bag of groceries (shaking the snow off his umbrella as he goes) and sees a lump jutting out from the kotatsu he didn’t even know he had. There’s a shock of daylily orange hair, and he isn’t surprised at the unannounced intrusion. Not really. 

“Ichigo-kun,” Kisuke pokes the boy with Benihime. He feels her laughter, in the back of his mind. “Good morning, Ichigo-kun,” he tries again.

There is no response; the God-slaying teenager curls into a tighter ball, and it would be cute if it wasn’t his electric bill going through the roof. 

For half a moment, he thought, Is Ichigo sick? But the pandemic doesn’t affect the dead, can’t be spread by gigai (for all it looks like a body, it’s really not). It’s going to take more than a virus to kill him, and Ichigo’s reiatsu should- in theory- protect him. 

Is this a human thing? Isshin’s never any help, and Yoruichi’s gone to rule the world from the shadows. Tessai’s with Hachi… So, he makes a judgement call to gather additional information. 

“Oh is Ichigo-kun hibernating again?” Orihime chirps on the phone, her optimism immovable through two wars and a college entrance exam. “Thank you for taking care of him, Urahara-san!” 

Normal human beings do not hibernate, but wheels begin turning in Urahara’s mind.

“How did you get this number? Kurosaki? Is he sleeping again?” Ishida asks, exasperated. “Tell him to wake up and get back over here. We have a group project due in three days, and I’m not covering his sorry ass again.” 

Well, that’s no help. So, he calls Shinji. 

“Ichigo’s hibernatin’? Why am I not surprised?” Shinji snorts, almost chortling. “Kisuke, ya know what his hollow is. Why da’ya think he’s hibernatin’?”

Oh. Oh. Well, if that’s the case, then this is truly fascinating. “I had no idea hollow characteristics carry over to the living,” he says in wonder. “But then again, Ichigo-kun is singularly unique and the only case of a living body and a hollow coexisting together in a symbiotic relationship since conception. I wonder if-” 

Shinji cuts him off before he could really get on a tangent. “Yeah, well ya have fun wit’ that. Just give the kid somethin’ warm to wear and some hot food. He’s a reptile, and ya know how that is.”

He doesn’t quite know how that is – not really- given that he’s never had a pet lizard before (but maybe this has some degree of similarity? Does a human-lizard hollow hybrid count?). He did indeed pass basic biology, so he gives it a try. 

Absently, Kisuke extrapolates and wonders if Shinji’s hair grows an extra coat during the winter, but he’s not so much in a hurry to get his ass kicked that he’d actually ask. 

* * *

He disappears into his lab post haste; three explosion and eight hours of work later, he emerges with a rather large light bulb on a stick. The light bulb is the size of Ichigo’s head, and it's attached to a stick buzzing with censors and warmers.

He observes Ichigo with clinical interest, watching the boy defrost one muscle at a time from the heat of the lamp. Even his hair seemed to regain some life, spiking up just a tad more than usual.

“Geta-boushi?” Ichigo stirs, bumping his head on the lamp with a hiss. “What the hell are you doing here?” 

Eight minutes and thirty seconds. He marks that down in his records. 

“Ah Ichigo-kun, you seem to have collapsed in my humble little shop.” He diverts. “How careless of you!”

Ichigo sighs, and rubs his head tiredly. Lethargic, almost. “Ah, sorry about that,” he says. “I should probably head back; Ishida’s gonna be pissed. He gets up, grimacing about the cold. 

He doesn’t notice the oddly shaped sunburn over his forehead where the lamp was positioned a tad too close, while the bottom half of his face was hidden by his arm. Kisuke notices and doesn’t tell him. 

Instead, he does notice when he gets a random flying foot to the face one day while restocking the shop. “What the hell, Geta-boushi! You gave me a freaking tan on half of my face, and now my classmates think I have vitiligo!” screams the foot. 

* * *

It happens again two weeks later, and this time Kisuke puts the kotatsu away. He finds Ichigo leaning against the generator of the shop, with its hum and warmth lulling the teen to sleep. The tan was unfortunately still there, a great big blotch over his forehead matching the contour of his arm.

Well, the lamp worked. But not quite so. 

He reworks his original plans, scraps the project and comes up with something else. This time he hauls a large flat rock from the gardening shop next door and sets it on his lab table. It’s an exercise in patience to carve kido runes onto the stone by hand and charge it without making it break (one slow pulse at a time), but he manages it in a couple of hours. He tentatively pokes it with a finger. Warm.

He hauls the stone out onto the living room, and plops the snoozing teen next to it. 

Predictably, Ichigo sleepily migrates to the rock and sprawls all the way on top of it. 

He’s very effective at maximizing the surface area in contact with the rock even when unconscious, Urahara thinks. He makes another note. 

Twelve minutes and forty-two seconds later, Ichigo rouses. 

“Geta-Boushi?” Ichigo asks drowsily. “What are you –oh ow,” he says, suddenly a crick in the back and by gods he must be getting old if even his back is hurting. 

“Maa, Ichigo-kun, you fell asleep at my shop again,” Kisuke says. “Though this is also quite interesting, of course. Would you like to stay the night? I can monitor your melatonin levels-“

“Nah, it’s okay. Thanks, Geta-boushi,” Ichigo says tiredly. “By the way, what is this?” he lifts up the rock with one arm and prods it curiously. 

“It’s a new invention of mine- a warming rock,” he beams. “Perfect for hibernating reptiles during the winter. It’s environmentally friendly too, running on charged kido runes to generate excess energy dissipated through heat.”

Ichigo looks at him oddly, if also a bit resigned to his oddities. 

“Yeah, thanks a bunch, Geta-boushi,” Ichigo gets up with a groan and leaves through a dimensional rip. He takes the rock with him. 

* * *

The third time he’s working in his labs again, this time wondering if he can make a self-heating blanket with sleeves, using the same kido runes from the rock. There are some calculations and adjustments to be made of course; the biggest kink in this prototype seems to be static electricity shorting out the runes, of all obstacles to run into. 

Kisuke lets out a frustrated huff, pulling his own blankets closer to him. The labs aren’t heated of course- there’s hardly any need (that is, if the explosions he generates doesn’t set the entire place on fire in the first place). 

A Garaganta opens up behind him, and a body collapses against his shoulder. 

“Ichigo-kun, what-,” he begins. 

Ichigo mumbles unintelligibly, his words swallowed by a mouthful of fleece. He burrows into the blanket nest with speed and huddles close to the shopkeeper. 

“Ichigo-kun, your feet are cold,” Kisuke pouts, poking Ichigo with a pen. 

“Just shut up and don’t move,” Ichigo grumbles sleepily, tightening his grip on Kisuke’s trunk and includes his arms at that. 

Well, this works too, Kisuke muses, humoring the teen. He hums to fill the silence (effectively pinned by the teen’s warmth-hogging ways, but he doesn’t particularly mind). It takes Ichigo five minutes to warm up this time, but they rest for another hour. Then two. Kisuke loses his count to sleep, but somehow that doesn’t seem to really matter anymore. 

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is brought to you by the collective of cywscross' Uraichi discord server. Lol jk- there was an event going on, so I took it as a writing exercise/break from my current WIP. Just switch fandoms for a bit. 
> 
> Anyways, pseudoscience nerd Kisuke is so easy to write. xD Honestly, this was a lot of fun to write.
> 
> Merry Christmas, everyone!


End file.
